Arizona State coaches study Coughlin

Ohm Youngmisuk has covered the Giants, Jets and the NFL since 2006. Prior to that, he covered the Nets, Knicks and the NBA for nearly a decade. He joined ESPNNewYork.com after working at the New York Daily News for almost 12 years and is a graduate of Michigan State University.
Follow him on Twitter »Ohm's chat archive »

Tom Coughlin likes to read a book every offseason. Most of the time it is on a famous general or a legendary leader from history.

Coughlin always wants to better himself and perhaps incorporate something new for his team.

The Arizona State football coaching staff is doing the same thing this year. In fact, the the Sun Devils coaches are reading about Coughlin.

I saw the folks over at Giants 101 link to an Azcentral.com blog about how the ASU coaches are reading Coughlin's book, “Earn The Right To Win.”

Arizona State head coach Todd Graham said his coaches are listening to the audio book and will discuss it with the players later this summer.

“I think it really fits us right now,” Graham told Azcentral.com. “If you get a chance, just read the beginning of it. Michael Strahan says, ‘Hey, Tom Coughlin, I couldn’t stand the guy. He comes in here, he has all the stupid, petty rules. I didn’t understand why you had to wear the same colored socks to practice. What does that have to do with winning?’

“And so it really correlates to what our players went through our first year here and about building trust,” Graham continued. “Strahan said, ‘When I decided to start taking pride in those stupid, petty rules, that’s when I became an All-Pro and that’s when we won the Super Bowl.’ I thought it was a great testimony for us.”

According to Azcentral.com, Graham is a stickler –- like Coughlin -- for how his players wear their uniforms, even during summer workouts.

“We came in and tried to establish who we are,” Graham explained. “Our character, our discipline, our work ethic -– but we’ve just kind of installed the minimum. I want to be a smart football team. And there are just a lot of illustrations (in that book) that will be good for us. We’re just trying to get everybody to improve.”

Perhaps Graham might want to follow one of Coughlin's most well-known commandments -- to show up on time and have players all show up for meetings at least five minutes early. Coughlin would approve of that.